HOME | DD

Description
Mitch is going to live forever.

No, for real. He feels that so hard right now; every fiber in his being, every muscle and ligament and bone and cell feels invincible. If he jumped out that window right now, not only would he survive uninjured, but he'd land on his feet too. He could take six bullets. He could take 6,000 bullets. He could die.

Only he won't. Because he's going to live forever.

It doesn't really matter to him how he achieved this superhuman state, this divinity. Mitch sees his methods as a means to an end. It's the quickest, easiest way to a nirvana unparalleled, and the pain it gives him afterwards is just the price his has to pay for his rewards. The others didn't see it that way. They didn't understand it like Mitch did. They didn't get it, and now they'll never experience what Mitch is feeling. They'll die while Mitch endures, through the storms of the centuries, the tempests of the millennia, the eternity of the universe.

They'll regret it. While they age, Mitch will stay young. They'll wish they'd followed him just one more time.

Mitch knows it's cos of the lies they were fed in school. Drugs will kill you. Pfft. Whatever. Mitch has done a lot of drugs, and for a long time, and he's still here. He's done five lines of coke in one sitting before, which is a lot. Then he felt twice as powerful as he does now. That was the best. Sure, the crash wasn't fun, but it was worth it.

Drugs won't kill you, unless like everything else in life, you have bad luck and get poor quality.

Mitch doesn't have bad luck.

He's going to live forever.

Mitch goes to the doctor once the drugs clear his system. That's the worst time, the interminable time that he has to keep sober. He goes to get prescribed for whatever medication he can get his hands on. This time, he thinks he'll try for more sleeping pills, the really strong kind. Last time he got some great anti-depressants.

He actually used to go to several doctors, but they all got slapped on the wrist for prescribing things like Xanax too liberally. So Mitch found a new one with a sparkly clean record. Dr. Elliot's not that bad, even. She's an older lady, probably mid-fifties. Very maternal, matriarchal. Last time, or sometime, she asked him if he wanted to get tested for any STDs. Of course Mitch said yes.

Drugs aren't the real danger. Shit like AIDS is the problem. But people blame that on sharing heroin needles more than unprotected sex. Mitch wears a condom every time, no matter what. He won't see his forever ruined by something preventable.

Dr. Elliot reenters the room. She sits down. This isn't good. She never sits down. "Mitch, I have bad news. You tested positive for HIV."

Mitch releases a breath that had been held for longer than he can remember. "But I use protection every time." They got the results wrong. They're trying to scare him into submission. They all hate him.

"I can't say what happened. Maybe your condom broke. Do you know who all of your partners have been with?" Her face is neutral, instead of warm like it usually is.

"Am I gonna die?" An hour ago, that question was outside the realm of possibility. To speak of death as a reality was to blaspheme.

"It doesn't look good."

They did it. They found the chink in his armor, the one thing that frightened him. They won. Too quiet for Dr. Elliot's ears, he hears himself whisper without thinking, "I'm gonna live forever."

Mitch feels too human, too vulnerable, too open to the attack that already happened.

He's not as immortal as he was yesterday.